Fran Kelly, former ABC radio host, blasted by Osman Faruqi, Nine reporters over new show Frankly

A media brawl is kicking off in the ABC after veteran radio broadcaster Fran Kelly was named as the host of the corporation’s new weekly talk show.

Kelly, 64, was announced as the host of a new Friday night TV primetime arts and culture talk show Frankly, but the decision left some younger voices in the media blasting it as a ‘missed opportunity’.

Under the headline ‘Fran Kelly is fine and familiar, but she’s not the future of the ABC’, Nine culture reporter Thomas Mitchell said he was disappointed in finding out Kelly ‘who is aged in her 60s, would be the host of Frankly’.

Fran Kelly, here seen at the premiere of the musical Hamilton in Sydney, has been appointed the host for a new ABC talk show Frankly

‘Frankly, I don’t know why I got my hopes up’, he fumed in the Sydney Morning Herald.

Mitchell argued the show should have gone to an up-and-coming comedian or a young YouTuber or TikToker, where the ABC might ‘unearth Australia’s next great TV talent’. 

‘Rather than playing it safe and dusting off Kelly after six months on the shelf, the ABC should have invested in the future instead of pandering to the past,’ Mitchell wrote.

ABC reporter Jordan Fennell criticised her employer’s decision to get Kelly to host the new show

‘A Friday night chat hosted by Fran Kelly might satisfy what’s left of the ABC’s Boomer audience, but it’s a sign the broadcaster seems to have given up on high-production, prime-time content aimed at younger audiences.’

Mitchell even found some support among the ranks of ABC staff with the national broadcaster’s Asia Pacific reporter Jordan Fennell bemoaning the lack of youth-oriented content.

‘I love Fran Kelly, but I agree with this, the ABC really needs to invest in younger talent and programs/formats that target that,’ she tweeted.

‘They’ve axed The Signal, Triple J is suffering, no one under 45 really tunes in for appointment TV or appointment anything…’ 

Among Kelly’s defenders was former Fairfax journalist now media academic Jenna Price

Other Nine figures also lined up to criticse the decision.

 ‘I’m an old fart, and a Fran fan too, but I have to agree. Move over and give someone younger a go!’ tweeted Good Food Guide editor Roslyn Grundy.

Two Nine reporters Meg Watson and Osman Faruqi aired their dismay in a podcast called ‘Has the ABC given up on young people?’

Good Food Guide editor Roslyn Grundy said she thought Kelly was too old to host the new show

Faruqi said he had even thought the appointment of Kelly, who hosted ABC Radio National’s Breakfast show for 17 years before hanging up the microphone in December, was a joke.

‘I think my original reaction to it was, “oh, this is like a parody press release that somebody has put out”,’ he said.

Faruqi said it was ‘jarring’ to not see a younger presenter.

‘Now the ABC are doubling down … with someone who has been working at the broadcaster longer than we’ve been alive,’ he said.

However, the 64-year-old Kelly has her defenders.

Journalist Osman Faruqi was not impressed by Kelly getting the hosting gig saying he thought it was a joke as first

Writing in The Australian, veteran journalist James Madden took aim at Mitchell, Watson and Faruqi. 

He accused them of being ‘oblivious’ to ‘Kelly’s vast experience in the live music scene and arts administration before she entered journalism’. 

‘Those that recall the olden days, when Kelly’s voice used to crackle over the wireless, fondly remember her encyclopaedic knowledge of pop, rock and punk music across the decades,’ he wrote.

‘But for the “culture” club at Nine Newspapers, the journo who hosted the nation’s premier political radio show for 17 years is better off on the shelf.’

Kelly says she is excited about hosting the new show, which will talk to actors, musicians as well as ‘big thinkers’ and ‘change makers’

Former Nine journalist and now media academic Jenna Price said Mitchell’s suggestion of getting young comedian Nina Oyama to host was a good one but there should be an old hand working with her.

‘Oh my god Chris Mitchell, you’ve had a brilliant idea. A two hander with Fran Kelly and Nina Oyama. This should happen right now. (Also, kitten, old people can be the future),’ she tweeted.

Kelly has not weighed into the stoush but said last Wednesday she was ‘excited’ about hosting the new show Frankly.

‘People have been asking ever since what’s next for me,’ she said.

‘Well this is it and I can’t wait. More great conversations, a live audience and my own band … what’s not to be excited about. It’s such a privilege and going to be so much fun’. 

Frankly promises to be a ‘glitzy’ show that talks to actors, musicians, ‘big thinkers’ and ‘change makers’ in front of a studio audience and with its own rock band.